


5+1: Are they or aren't they?

by Senket



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-26
Updated: 2011-02-26
Packaged: 2017-11-15 15:08:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/528597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Senket/pseuds/Senket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>based on the prompt from <a href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/"></a><b>sherlockbbc_fic</b> Part XI: <em>5 times people asked themselves or each other, "Lestrade and Mycroft,  are they....?", and one time when all those people were invited to a  civil parternship ceremony.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	5+1: Are they or aren't they?

**Author's Note:**

> Have something fluffy and cute to make up for the fireball of destruction I just posted ;_;

** ANTHEA ** , end of Study in Pink

She’d been seated inside the car, tapping away in Cantonese, for a full ten minutes before she realized the vehicle had yet to move. It wasn’t that she was thoughtless, but her head was full of languages not her own, cracking with information theoretically neither she nor Mycroft Holmes were supposed to have, and a minor misstep (switching dialects, for example) might cause a major political catastrophe. The young woman glanced about; her boss was nowhere near the car, so she leaned forward and glanced through the forward window- ah, there.

Mycroft had his back to her, so that she was unable to distinguish his expression, speaking to a fit, silver-haired man in his forties. She knew who he was, of course: Detective Inspector Lestrade, Murder, Scotland Yard. She knew, because she’d been sent to fetch Sherlock personally a time or two when the younger Holmes had first made acquaintance with the detective, whenever Mycroft had been particularly swamped. The third time the detective had bought her a cup of coffee, which hadn’t been unusual. His warm, amused smile but total lack of apparent romantic or sexual interest had set him apart, however. She wondered about that now, too far away to tell the nuances of the man’s smile as the two spoke, but noticing the way his hips were canted forward slightly as Lestrade leaned back against his vehicle. His hands were at his side, leaving himself open.

Mycroft, from what she could see, was not reacting particularly. He was leaning on his umbrella as always, legs crossed, free hand in his pocket. They stood a reasonable distance away, perhaps even far for the noise that police sirens made. How unusual.

Her phone shook against her fingers and, with a sigh, she returned to work.  
  


** SALLY AND ANDERSON **

They should not have been doing this, they both knew it. Mrs. Anderson was not only in town but had demanded her husband be home, since she was hosting bridge night. He despised bridge. Instead he’d called home sounding frantic, worn-down, exhausted, and begged off, because they were deep in a case and he needed to run a dozen tests at once. Then he’d changed into a suit his wife had never seen, that he always kept in Sally’s closet, and they’d gone out.

The restaurant was very nice and very expensive. They hadn’t had a night out in- well. They’d never had a night out. Sally looked delectable in purple satin. The place itself had an atmosphere that was- not _quite_ romantic, but decisively intimate.

Anderson felt himself go pale when his mistress glanced past him and suddenly froze, her eyes wide and surprised. “What? What’s wrong?”

She pointed past him without saying anything, and he turned expecting the worst. It was much stranger.

Greg was sitting across from- was that _Mycroft Holmes_?- clearly at ease despite the fact that he was the worst dressed in the place, and he was sitting across from a man that never wore less than a three-piece suit. _Not to mention Sherlock’s brother._

“Are they...? Is that...?”

The men weren’t holding hands, but neither were they. Sally had a mad gleam in her eyes; she stood and made for the loo, but the route she took was very strange and just happened to move within earshot of their boss.

She came back with her hands wet from washing, but clearly too soon to have actually used the facilities.

“So?”

“They were talking about the freak when I passed by,” she shrugged, shooting suspicious glimpses at the other couple.

Anderson was not convinced. They were both very good at what they did, and at least one of them had been bound to see Sally coming.  
  


** DIMMOCK **

Dimmock, recently promoted, already had some seriously strange problems he never would’ve expected. The first was Sherlock Holmes. The second was being stalked.

That one was new, but it couldn’t have been anything else. There was an expensive car with tinted windows creeping along beside him as he walked to the tube. He stopped, it stopped. He stared at it, it waited.

Maybe stalking was the wrong term. That was supposed to be sneaky. This was so obvious it hurt to think about. When he turned to face it, the driver got out and opened the door.

He was a DI; he was not going to get into a stranger’s car. But he leaned in the doorway, inspected the inside. There was a woman, her suit cut low, but she was ignoring him for her blackberry. He stood still for a moment before she pushed a tablet towards him. He picked it up; found that it was, in fact, a screen. He didn’t see what computer system it was supposedly connected to, but there was a video conference call on it, and the webcam light was green. He sat, but left the door open.

The man on the screen talked about Sherlock in a seemingly casual way, but Dimmock was at least smart enough to notice the warnings and threats in the light tone.

When he told Detective Inspector Lestrade about it, the man chuckled and his smile was far too knowing when he said ‘you’ll get used to it, Dimmock, my boy. Everyone does.’  
  


** SHERLOCK ** \- references to Study in Pink and The Great Game

Sherlock started to feel suspicious when Mycroft turned up at the dead cabbie crime scene. It wasn’t that they were in the same place; he knew Lestrade and Mycroft were acquainted from his first years knowing the detective. It was rather Mycroft’s diet. Despite his self-discipline in other areas of life, Mycroft was terribly lazy, terribly fond of food and terribly indulgent in those aspects sometimes. Despite that, said diet had been going well for a consistent three months now. That meant he had support.

That afternoon, Lestrade had revealed a little titbit of strangeness when he had invaded 221b Baker St: nicotine patches. In the five years they had known each other, Lestrade had tried to quit more times than were worth remembering. But here they were, off cigarettes. Three months.

The really curious thing was his total lack of extraneous information. Aside from that timing he loathed to call coincidence, there weren’t any other hints to a relationship between the two elder men. Of course, that didn’t mean anything definitive either; Mycroft was brilliant at hiding his affairs from Sherlock, and it didn’t help that often he thought it would better not to know.

He gave it little thought when, on the way to a scene, Lestrade had paused on the pavement, shooting a long, evaluating stare at a prim bakery before resuming his way; little thought, that was, until even John started getting texts from his brother. Holding to his diet, but requiring extensive dental work? _How curious._

The thought soon flitted out of his head, though. Five pips down to two. He had much more interesting things to do.

  


** JOHN **

John was never completely surprised to see Lestrade waiting in his flat when he got back. Sometimes Sherlock was there, sometimes he wasn’t. Sometimes there was a team of officers there, sometimes there wasn’t. Sometimes Mrs. Hudson was there, hovering over the man, offering him tea and biscuits with all the ease of a practiced waitress, winking like a much younger woman.

John was never completely surprised to see Mycroft waiting in his flat when he got back. Sometimes Sherlock was there, sometimes he wasn’t. Sometimes Anthea was there, waiting as well, sometimes she wasn’t. Sometimes Mrs. Hudson was there, hovering over the man, offering him tea and biscuits with all the ease of a worn housekeeper, dotting like an aunt. 

John was completely surprised to find them both there, waiting for Sherlock’s return. Lestrade had a folder of glossy high-resolution shots of a strange murder, Mycroft turning his umbrella between his hands. They were sitting across the room from each other, Lestrade in Sherlock’s chair and Mycroft in John’s, the union jack pillow on the table. The seats were not quite facing each other but the two men were. They looked relaxed; both smiling faintly in completely different ways.

John knew they hadn’t been talking, at least not when he’d come in downstairs, because the slim hall carried sound well.

They both glanced up at him, both smiles stretching but becoming cooler. He cleared his throat and beelined for the kitchen, feeling like an intruder in his own flat; his voice sounded a little high when he called over his shoulder, asking whether or not they’d like a cuppa. They were still looking at each other when he came back in, seemingly amused. He sat on the couch and waited with a pinched face. He hoped Sherlock would appear soon. The tension was excruciating.  
  


** +1 **

Anthea didn’t get an invitation. She booked Mycroft’s calendar; anyway, half of the ceremony was her own doing. That was all fine by her, because she was the primary witness. Since there was no bride to purposefully avoid competing against, she had every intention of spending her bonus on a dress to dazzle.

Sally’s invitation had a note scribbled in the corner that said ‘We didn’t send Anderson one, because we’d rather not worry about dramatics. Use your damn +1, would you? That’s why it’s there.’ She was happy blushes never showed on her face. Anderson choked when he saw it.

Dimmock was invited more as a joke than anything, because he’d been shooting Greg some strange looks lately. When he asked about it, Lestrade said he’d like another Detective Inspector around in case someone needed to distract Sherlock, because _he_ certainly wouldn’t be doing it. And it’d never hurt to have more police around, considering Mycroft’s ‘minor’ position.

Sherlock’s invitation didn’t have anything extra on it, but he still growled when he noticed the way Mycroft has deliberately, _cheekily_ italicized his f’s and t’s.

John’s invitation conveniently didn’t have an option for a plus-one.

Most of them were at least a little surprised, but they would all feel stupid admitting it.

 

  



End file.
